Moving Towards Madness
by Thalia Kendall
Summary: She never understood exactly how it started. Angelina Johnson, and a secret relationship that makes no sense. And yet, everything had been completely voluntary. One night brings a stunning confession, and maybe it's not that impossible after all. Oneshot


A/N: Hi, guys. Sorry I've not been around... my senior thesis (original fiction, not fanfic) had eaten my brain and heart and soul for the past... month and a half, about. But it is now done, and I'll start posting random fics that I have neglected to post. This A/M one-shot was written for my friend Savannah.  
  
Disclaimer: I fear Angelina's wrath and shall never try to steal Montague from her.

* * *

She couldn't say what, exactly, had started it.  
  
It wasn't the hot, squeezing handshake in the middle of the pitch, dark brown eyes glaring into ice-blue. It wasn't the strange run-in after the game she played against Hufflepuff, where Atkinson's Bludger had all but dislocated her shoulder and she passed him in the hallway-- she'd instinctively jumped out of the way, certain that he'd shove her exactly where it hurt-- but he paused, a strange look in his eyes, and pressed a vial of what was easily recognizeable as healing potion into her hand with cool fingers before disappearing.  
  
It wasn't even the time she, under cover of darkness and the influence of... something, had sat down next to his bed in the Infirmary after he'd been found after the twins had shoved him into the Vanishing cupboard. He'd woken up and she had fled without a word.  
  
And yet, this was the third month that she'd wordlessly let him into her Head student quarters and pulled his lips to hers before the door was even shut behind their backs.  
  
Angelina had no idea why she needed him-- or why he agreed to it all. It didn't make any sense, really, because they were enemies and neither of them were stupid and they had nothing in common. They never discussed it, because he was quiet and she was impatient and somehow, through it all, he knew exactly what to do.  
  
Tonight was warm, and her skin was damp afterwards, cooled by the breeze coming through the slightly open window. He kept his arm around her while he slept, and she felt a blush rising in her dusky cheeks when she saw where one of his hands had settled.  
  
They had less than a month left, really. And then the secret would be over, the dream dissolved. It would be for the best, and they always said that half the people you went to school with, you never saw again.  
  
He never sneered when he slept.  
  
She was so caught up in her thoughts that she didn't notice blue eyes snapping open and focusing upon her face.  
  
"You're awake," his voice was cool and calm, as indecipherable as his expression.  
  
She nodded, picking one of her hair ties (red and gold) off the nightstand and pulling her sweaty hair into a ponytail. He sat up, the covers falling away from his chest. She felt oddly dwarfed next to him. Fragile. He could hurt her if he tried.  
  
She almost cried out when she felt his fingers in her hair. His fingers, slightly rough, brushed hers and took the hair tie out of her hand. She felt his hands brush her nape as he bound her hair up himself, an oddly affectionate sort of gesture that had nothing to do with hate or rivalry or passion or opposition.  
  
"You wear your hair like this during matches," he remarked, sliding his fingers through the ponytail.  
  
"And you usually push me off my broom... or try to," she said softly, turning her head to see one of his hands resting on her shoulder. His hands were lighter than hers, with long, tapering fingers and a small burn scar on the right hand, under the knobby knuckles. Now the hand that had left bruises on her fingers only months before stroked down the length of her hair with a gentleness that made her shiver.  
  
"Montague," her voice was a forced calm. "We can't do this for much longer."  
  
The hand paused, and his voice sounded by her ear, a low growl. "We've a few more hours before sunrise."  
  
"I don't mean that," she whirled around, facing him with a scowl that wasn't quite firm and fixed. "It's May already."  
  
"And then we leave," he finished for her. "And I daresay you expect this just to be over."  
  
She paused and stared at him, her eyes going wide as his expression darkened, almost like the terribly-determined, hateful look he wore on the pitch. Almost.  
  
And suddenly he had pulled her back into his arms, bare skin against bare skin, damp and close and hot. Her bare back was to his chest, and his breath seared her shoulder.  
  
"Well, that's to be expected, isn't it?" he suddenly snarled. "Montague and Johnson. Enemies. We hate each other and take pleasure in each other's defeat. The Slytherin and the Gryffindor who have nothing in common and nothing to say. You're a halfblood and I'm fairly sure that one of those redheaded twit Beaters lusts after you. You and him will end up married amidst orange blossoms and pomp and circumstance and produce an obnoxiously Gryffindor Quidditch team of your own. I have every reason to hate you. None of this makes sense."  
  
"Exactly," she struggled to free herself from his iron grasp, but he was too strong. The friction of skin against skin burned, and tears came unbidden to her eyes. "We shouldn't be doing this."  
  
"And yet we are," his voice grew lower, softer, almost pensive. His grip, though, refused to relax. "I'm here with you every night, holding you until you fall asleep, and we're close enough to share breath. And the ironic thing in all of this..." he chuckled darkly, the sardonic sound vibrating in the night air, "YOU want it."  
  
The clasp of his arms suddenly disappeared, and Angelina felt strangely cold and bereft. He stood up, lighting a candle with his wand and crossing his arms over his bare chest as he stared down at her with unblinking blue eyes. "I've never forced you," he whispered. "You're in control. You always were."  
  
"I don't know where you're going with this," Angelina muttered, pulling the sheets up to her chest. His stare was hard and intense enough to pierce glass, and she was softer than that. "You should be leaving."  
  
"Aye, this is where you damn me to the token Slytherin Death Eater existence and a nice life to end face-to-face with a Dementor or an Auror with a Killing Curse on his lips, hmm?" his words were harsh and accusing, and she felt an inexplicable chill. "And what makes you think that I would just obey your bidding in this?"  
  
"Unless... unless you're going to talk sense, Montague," she forced a harshness that she didn't feel into her voice, "You had better leave."  
  
"I won't." Lightning-fast, a pale hand shot out and grasped her arm, and the sheet that she'd used to cover herself with fell away as he pulled her to her feet. "I'm not leaving you. Or this. Not now," he growled.  
  
She froze, and the wrist that she'd been trying to pull out of his grasp slackened. "You..."  
  
"Angelina," his shadow flickered on the wall, the light illuminating his chiselled features. "You were the one to start this... but you didn't know what you were starting, did you?" She shook her head mutely, and dark brown eyes widened as he released her wrist to cup her face, his fingers careful and light on her skin. "I'm not going to be thrown aside after THIS."  
  
Montague, in her recollection, was sullen and silent and haughty, reserved and tight-lipped and cold. She recognized the stern features on the face that stared down at hers, but her mind refused to process the words that emerged from his pale lips. "I want more than hate and passion, Angelina. These nightly visits aren't the end of it, or the entirety of it."  
  
He was supposed to call her 'Johnson' and speak her name with derision. "You..."  
  
"I love you."  
  
The words were spoken into still, stunned air, and with it came a feeling of light-headedness. He was lying, for sure, and Angelina shook her head even as his arms snaked around her waist.  
  
"I should hate you for it, you know," he was whispering into her hair as she resumed struggling, shaking her head violently to rid her mind of this siren song-- this dangerously seductive aria that would lead to nothing but disaster and a broken soul. "I should hate you for so many reasons. We both know that none of this makes sense... but YOU can't deny this any more than I can." His voice was almost arrogant in its self-assurance. She clenched tense brown hands into fists and slammed them into his chest, and he didn't budge, her curves fitting against his angles and his lips pressing against her temple. "I love you, and it's your fault for pulling me close enough for it to happen."  
  
"Stop saying it, you bastard," she hissed against his shoulder, her voice shaky. There were so many shouldn't-have-beens already that she'd lost track, and he was never emotional or direct.  
  
"You'll just have to deal with that, won't you?" his voice wasn't really mean as he tipped her chin up with his hand. "Get used to the idea that we Slytherins are capable of humanity?" Her eyes went wide as they met the intent seriousness of his. And then the corners of his lips quirked into a strange... not quite sardonic smile, and she felt a twinge in her chest as he dipped his head, his lips mere centimetres from hers.  
  
"I was shocked when I found that out, too." And then he was kissing her and warmth shot through her body from head to toe as his fingers stroked down her back and her arms, of their own volition, looped around his neck. All the madness of the world swirled into a hazy, distant corner of her mind as the senses took over.  
  
This time around, it was different, slower than before. His lips trailed from hers slowly, and she sighed as he carefully explored every inch of her skin. This time, for the first time, she cried when she came, and they whispered each other's names in the dark. His whisper of 'Angelina' was muffled by her lips, and she didn't wake once until the sun had risen.

* * *

It had been five minutes on the train, in an empty compartment after she'd gone on a search for the food trolley. A locking charm and a hand over her mouth, even as he buried his face in her hair and inhaled. She knew the strength of the arm that had wrapped around her waist from behind.  
  
"What now?" she had managed to gasp in between breathless kisses.  
  
"I don't know," he answered, his lips buried in her neck. "But I won't... disappoint you."  
  
There was no time, of course, and even now, no one knew. He pulled a quill out of his pocket and transfigured it into a rose, and then she was left with sweetness and thorns and intoxication. He left without a word, and salt tears fell on pricked fingers. She didn't tell a soul.

* * *

The war loomed up ahead, and there wasn't the shelter of the school any more. There were bigger things than Quidditch and House rivalry and she drifted apart from her old classmates. In an empty butterbeer bottle on her desk, there was a pristine white quill that she never used, and Angelina went to bed alone these days, exhausted and weary and worried.  
  
She was woken up one night a year later by an owl's insistent tapping on her windowsill, and when she let the bird inside, it dropped a rose into her lap, its thorns retracting even as its crimson petals bleached white and pure. Her eyes widened at the note under the quill, short and to-the-point, and pulled the door open.  
  
A cloaked stranger strode in, except he wasn't really a stranger, and for some reason, Angelina didn't question or worry or consider when he had to leave now. Perhaps because he really didn't seem to have the inclination to play fair now, and pulled her into his arms for a kiss before the door was even shut behind his back, and then she realized that her heart had, after all, traveled across the distant oceans with him and it really didn't matter any more how right it was.  
  
It was much later on that she looked drowsily at his sleeping face, her dark fingers tracing over the bare, unblemished skin of the strong arm wrapped around her waist, and smiled to herself before closing her eyes and falling asleep--- oddly without a care in the world. 


End file.
